I love Santa Clara City, and I love Washington Open School.

Washington Elementary is a unique and wonderful school. It is a parent participation school. Each family is required to put in minimum 4 hours in school per week. With our love for the school, many parents are putting in well more then the minimum required time into the school. It creates a sense of community, much like a church. You get to know the other parent, the other kids... it is amazing.

The teachers are incredible and very creative in teaching; they aren't burnt out like so many other teachers because they have so much help from the parents. In class, Parents host different activity centers that allows the kids to work in smaller more focused groups. Imagine having tutoring available every day for every student, and arts and crafts, cooking etc everyday all led by parents. I'm doing ceramic for the class this year.

With the support of the school and parents, kids have lots of field trips throughout the school years, see a play, go to beach, visit museum, I love it.

City of Santa Clara

City of Santa Clara has a lot of history. It founded in 1777 and incorporated in 1852. The city is the site of the eighth of 21 California missions, and was named after the mission. The City has a long tradition of exemplary public services and a well-maintained infrastructure.

Santa Clara is located in the center of Silicon Valley, and is home to the headquarters of Intel, Applied Materials, Sun Microsystems, NVIDIA, Agilent Technologies, and many other high-tech companies. It is home to both Mission College and Santa Clara University.

Median Home price is about $583,092. The Real Estate market is very active due to its affordability price for the first time home buyers and investors. Total 110 homes sold in September, 2009. Currently there are 61 single homes and 43 townhouse/condos for sale on the market as 11/22/2009.

What I like about Santa Clara City?

• City of Santa Claar's Free Metro WiFi.
• Affordable housing, family neighborhoods.
• Santa Clara City owns and operates an electric utility called Silicon Valley Power. It dramatically lowers electricity and gas costs than in neighboring cities.
• Santa Clara is a "Green City", and has won a number of awards for their environmental efforts.
• 38 municipal parks and playgrounds.
• Great community.
• Excellent elementary schools, such as Washington Open & Millikin Basics +.
• Easy commute to work.
• Historic Walking Tour - Take the self-guided walking tour of historic Santa Clara, with stops at 36 homes and structures that played important roles in the history of the City. Walking Tour Map (PDF) Home Descriptions (PDF)
• Many cute tree-lined streets, and lots of Victorian houses.
• Great Library
• Santa Clara University brings lots of business opportunity and prosperity to the city.
• San Francisco 49ers Proposal for a Football Stadium in the City of Santa Clara. http://santaclaraca.gov/index.aspx?page=1197
• The San Francisco 49ers NFL football team has its heaquarters and practice facilities in Santa Clara. (November 8, 2006, the 49ers announced their intention to move the team to Santa Clara, after negotiations failed with the city of San Francisco to build a new stadium)
• The International Swim Center hosts the Santa Clara Aquamaids, the best aquamaids in the US.
• Lots of city events, The Art of Crafts Exhibition, Art and Wine Festival, Free Concerts in the Park…
• There is an annual city-wide spring clean up where you can dump furniture and other large items to be thrown away, or re-used by scavengers.
• Farmers' market every Saturday.
• Lots of ethnic diversity.
• Paramount's Great America Theme Park
• Santa Clara Golf & Tennis Club
• Triton Museum of Art
• The city has partnerships/internships with students who are involved in city government.

District News

Santa Clara Busy with Development, Expansions by Businesses 12/5/2009

Santa Clara city planner Carol Anne Painter provided SILVAR members at a recent Cupertino/Sunnyvale District tour meeting with a very positive outlook for the city, noting there’s lots of activity taking place and more to come.

Painter described Santa Clara as “an island in the middle of the storm.” The city is doing well financially compared to its neighbors, she said. Painter attributed much of Santa Clara’s good fortune to the city’s ownership of its own water and power, which enables the city to provide these services to residents and businesses at a lower cost. The city utility has the lowest system wide average electricity cost in California.

Painter said both power and water facilities are moving towards green and becoming more energy efficent. Right now, 30 percent of power produced by Silicon Valley Power comes from renewable sources and 11 percent of the city’s water is recycled and predominantly used for irrigation.

The city with a population of 117,000 people is bursting with activity. Painter disclosed Yahoo’s plans to build a new campus that would include about three million square feet of office space. The campus location is just a short distance from the Santa Clara Convention Center and the site of a proposed stadium for the San Francisco 49ers.

More projects have been approved or are pending approval, requested by businesses like NVIDIA, Sobrato, Regency, Intel and Applied Materials, to mention but a few. Development is planned by the BART station and a downtown plan with 400 housing units and 130,000 sq. ft. of retail is on the books for the area by the Santa Cara transit station. There are plans for the former Kaiser building, and plans for the addition of 675,000 square feet of new retail on the Santa Clara side of Valley Fair mall by the Safeway store. Mission College also has a new master plan to expand its campus.

Painter also addressed the proposed NFL stadium for the 49ers. She said the planning commission will discuss the proposed stadium concept, the approved term sheet and a project schedule at a special meeting. The commission will also present the stadium’s environmental impact report. She expects the city council will determine when the stadium issue will go to a public vote at its December 8 meeting.

“We have really been busy,” Painter exclaimed. “The city has lots of incentives for development.”

-- Article from Silicon Valley Association of REALTORS® Member News